Monday, September 19, 2016

Six of state's eight Catholic dioceses under investigation

Four more Catholic dioceses — Erie, Greensburg, Pittsburgh and
Scranton — have been swept into a grand jury investigation of clergy sex
abuse and cover-up allegations in communities stretching from the
Delaware River to the Monongahela.

On Friday, officials in all
four dioceses confirmed they received subpoenas from the Pennsylvania
attorney general's office. Their confirmations come a day after the
Harrisburg Diocese told the newspaper that it, too, had gotten a
subpoena.

The Allentown Diocese also is part of the grand jury probe,
according to a state lawmaker who testified before the grand jury in
Pittsburgh. Allentown diocesan officials have declined to comment on the
probe.

State prosecutors have been taking testimony in Pittsburgh
for months in a wide-ranging investigation that started with a scathing
March report detailing allegations of abuse by about 50 priests and
other religious leaders in the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese and a cover-up
by church officials.

Only the Allentown Diocese has not
confirmed receipt of the subpoena.

After Mass Saturday evening at St.
Ann's church in Emmaus, where the pastor was charged days earlier with
possessing child pornography, Allentown Bishop John O. Barres refused to
address a Morning Call reporter's questions about the subpoena and
probe.

Pittsburgh
Bishop David Zubik issued a statement Friday evening saying that with
its subpoena, the diocese received a letter from Deputy Attorney General
Daniel Dye, which said, "Our efforts do not have to be adversarial. ...
Our work to protect children and seek the truth should be a joint
endeavor."

Zubik noted he agreed with Dye, adding, "In the ongoing
need to protect children from abuse, I welcome the opportunity to work
closely with the state attorney general's office."

The Greensburg
Diocese in southwestern Pennsylvania "received a subpoena from the
statewide investigative grand jury," spokesman Jerry Zufelt said in a
statement.

The
findings of an investigation into allegations of sexual abuse related
to child pornography committed by John Mraz, a member of the Roman
Catholic clergy.

"The
diocese is cooperating, and will continue to cooperate, with law
enforcement officials in this matter," Zufelt said. "The Diocese of
Greensburg takes the protection of all children and young people
seriously. Names and facts of any allegation of misconduct will continue
to be reported immediately to the proper civil authorities."

Scranton
Diocese spokesman Bill Genello also confirmed the subpoena, saying in a
statement: "In its commitment to protecting children and young people
and to providing support to victims of sexual abuse, the Diocese of
Scranton cooperates fully with all civil authorities in their
investigation of such matters."

An Erie spokeswoman also confirmed a subpoena.

Allentown spokesman Matt Kerr said Friday the diocese would have no further comment beyond the statement it released Thursday.

It
read in part: "The Diocese of Allentown is committed to the protection
and safety of children and young people. To this end, it is the policy
of the Diocese of Allentown to cooperate with law enforcement."

On
Tuesday, Monsignor John Stephen Mraz, pastor of St. Ann's in Emmaus,
was charged with viewing and downloading child pornography after the
diocese reported to state and county authorities that a parishioner
found images on Mraz's computer that made him feel "uncomfortable,"
court records say.

The Altoona-Johnstown Diocese did not get a
subpoena because the attorney general's office released its grand jury
report of that region in March. The report led to charges against three
Franciscan friars for alleged child endangerment and criminal
conspiracy.

The agency also set up a hotline for people to call to
report abuse claims across the state.

Likewise, the Philadelphia
Archdiocese, the state's largest Catholic division, is not part of the
new investigation.

Since 2003, city prosecutors had two grand juries and
issued three reports that uncovered allegations of sexual abuse against
hundreds of priests that church officials never reported to law
enforcement.

The attorney general's office does not comment on
secret grand jury matters, agency spokesman Jeffrey Johnson said.
However, he added, the hotline has generated hundreds of calls and
remains open.

The statewide probe was revealed Thursday by The
Morning Call, citing state Rep. Mark Rozzi, D-Berks, who said he
recently testified before the grand jury. On Friday, Rozzi, who says he
was abused by an Allentown Diocese priest in 1984, called police after a
man phoned his office with threatening comments.

"We just had a
really overzealous constituent who is very Catholic, who called and was
making crazy remarks to my staff," Rozzi said. "He's called before and
my staff was just very concerned. We wanted to make sure we alerted
Capitol police and local police."

There is a lot of blame to go
around for why a grand jury is probing dioceses, said Gregory P. Lloyd, a
Catholic from Whitehall Township who runs an organization dedicated to
restoring church tradition.

"The church is at fault for inadequate
preparation or unfaithful teaching of young men in the Christian way to
serve others, principally by self-sacrifice while in seminary," he
said. "There is a long period of preparation of a man, to cure him of
what ails every human being, before he can be sent to serve, and heal,
others."

At the same time, he added, given that former state
Attorney General Kathleen Kane resigned after being found guilty of
perjury, the office can not be trusted to conduct a fair investigation.
He also takes issue with why it would target this one institution.

Grand
jury investigations are the only way to uncover abuses that were
allowed to happen for decades, said the Rev. Thomas Doyle, an inactive
priest from Virginia, who has testified before a Philadelphia grand jury
and in other probes across the country and world.

In
light of the Pittsburgh grand jury, the Pennsylvania Catholic League,
the leading Harrisburg lobbying group for dioceses and Catholic
religious orders, urged survivors of clergy sex abuse to contact law
enforcement and their local diocese for help.

"The Pennsylvania
Catholic Conference encourages survivors of child sexual abuse — no
matter when or where it occurred — to contact authorities and report
it," association spokeswoman Amy Hill said. "We want to be sure everyone
who wants help has access to support resources."